Chapter Text
“Did you hear?”
“The omega in Class C-3 is offering heat time in the second-floor boys’ bathroom. Fifty yen for five minutes.”
Asa tensed at the whispers of her classmates.
Shut up!
While she hated awkward silences in social settings, Asa needed complete silence to solve integral problems. All these teenagers around her were the reason that she couldn't focus.
Quit yapping!
Her grades in mathematics were slipping as it was. She already struggled with intrusive thoughts surrounding the events concerning Yuko, the Chicken Devil, and the class president in addition to the near-constant barrage of comments from her skull’s devilish roommate.
“No fucking way. Really?”
“Really. Completely unmedicated.”
“That shit can’t be safe, can it?”
“Do you think I care?”
“Your beta ass wouldn't understand,” interjected another classmate.
“Well, what’s the omega offering that’s so good it’s worth the risk?”
“Just about anything you want as long as you pay up front and use a condom.”
“Anything? Like…”
The beta kid ducked his head down and mouthed the word.
“S-e-x?”
One of Asa’s alpha classmates rolled his eyes.
“Duh. What else?” he shot back in a furious whisper.
Morons.
Every high school boy was a moron, but the alpha ones were exceptionally dumber than the rest. This little operation could collapse in a millisecond once faculty caught wind of it, yet here they were conspiratorially whispering about it in the middle of math class.
“Oh…wow, I guess that is a pretty good deal,” the beta kid conceded.
“It’s stress relief that’s cheaper than something from a vending machine.”
As Asa eavesdropped, she squeezed her black mechanical pencil tightly in her fist.
That would explain it. Asa ground her pencil down on the piece of scrap paper, drawing squiggles and three-dimensional cubes. That would explain, despite her careful routine of medications, why she was so irritable and on edge in English class an hour ago. English class was on the second floor, right across from that bathroom. Her medications felt like they stopped working because of a stupid omega student.
Pheromones and hormones. Airborne biochemical olfactory signaling compounds and even stupider internal signaling molecules. Gross.
She hated that all this stuff applied to her.
“An ‘omega’?” Yoru asked as she tucked back a section of slightly greasy black hair behind her ear. When she wasn’t controlling their shared body, Yoru the War Devil appeared to Asa as a projected visual and audible hallucination—opaque, but intangible and invisible to other people. Asa’s mirror image with three intersecting scars across her cheekbones. Right now, Yoru was sitting on the edge of Asa’s desk, picking at her nails and sighing loudly on repeat.
Asa internally groaned. She’d explained the whole human sex situation to her devilish head partner dozens of times, but Yoru possessed selective hearing and a short attention span.
“You want one of those, right? An ‘omega?’”
“Not really.”
It was difficult for Asa to communicate with Yoru by thoughts alone, but she was more or less getting the hang of it now by necessity.
“You said something about bonding with an ‘omega’ before.”
“Yes, pair bonding is a thing I’m biologically capable of doing.”
“‘Pair’ implies there are only two of you, yes? An ‘alpha’ and an ‘omega?’”
“Yes…?”
“You’re an alpha, aren’t you?”
Yoru knew this about her already—they shared the same body, didn’t they? Asa was an alpha, but she didn’t resemble one. Sure, she was basically flat-chested and had wider shoulders than most girls her age, but other than that, she didn’t look much different than anyone else on the street, beta and omega people included. Appearance-wise, she was a far cry from the hulking lump of alpha meat named Akoku Seigi.
“Why, yes! That’s correct, Yoru,” Asa said bitingly.
Yoru preened herself like she just discovered the secret to world peace. Asa sighed. This devil couldn’t detect sarcasm. She was about as bright as a blackout curtain. The porchlight was on, but no one was ever home, as far as Asa could tell.
“And you can only do it—this ‘pair bonding’—once?”
“Yes?” Asa responded in an irritated manner.
“Perfect. Go to the boys’ bathroom and make that omega yours,” Yoru declared, pointing to the classroom door.
“What? Are you kidding me?”
“I’m not turning you into a kid!”
“No! I can’t do that!”
The loud outburst caused the attention of the entire class, including Mr. Tanaka’s temporary replacement, to focus on her. Asa felt her face turn bright red.
“Ah, perfect timing,” Yoru purred. The devil easily pushed Asa to the side, took over control of her body, and stood.
“I have to urinate,” Yoru announced to the classroom using Asa’s voice and body. The devil couldn’t be bothered to adopt Asa’s mannerisms for less than a minute.
Mr. Tanaka’s replacement’s right eyebrow rose.
“Desperately,” Yoru added with dramatic emphasis, theatrically crossing her legs to demonstrate her need.
“Go…go ahead, Mitaka.”
“Happily.”
Yoru left the classroom and headed toward the stairwell at the end of the hall.
“Yoru, please don’t do this,” Asa begged as she tried to resume control. No matter how desperately she tried to pry Yoru’s fingers away from the metaphorical controls, Yoru stayed firmly in place.
“What’s the matter with my idea? It’s not like you’re going to use this ‘pair bond’ anytime soon by yourself,” the devil in Asa’s head remarked as she opened the door to the stairwell.
“Pair bonds are special—this is like—”
“If it’s that special, then an omega belonging to you will be an excellent weapon,” Yoru mused as she walked up the stairs. “I bet they will be a melee weapon. A spear-thrower, a kusarigama, a halberd—ooh, you know what I hope your omega might turn into? A guisarme!”
Asa’s thoughts flew at a mile a minute as Yoru stopped at the first platform at the top of the first flight of stairs.
“Please, Yoru. If you want me to properly obtain an omega, I need to be in charge of every single interaction here.”
“You won’t do it if I let you have control,” Yoru countered as she began to ascend up the second flight of stairs to the second floor.
“Yes, I will!”
“No, you won’t.”
“Will!”
“Won’t!”
“Yoru, you’re a devil. As far as I know, devils don’t deal with any of this kind of stuff. Do you even know how to do a pair bond correctly?” Asa argued.
“No, but—"
“Listen to your host, little sister.”
Yoru nearly slipped and fell down the stairs at the appearance of the stranger.
It’s her.
Asa vaguely recognized the girl—light-colored hair cut short to her chin, a leather cap, and long dangling earrings.
A Devil Hunter Club member.
The girl tilted her head precariously like she had acute torticollis. With swirling eyes, she stared at Yoru and Asa. Her eyes were similar to the ones that the War Devil possessed.
“…Famine?” Yoru exclaimed aloud, clenching her fists closed.
Asa could do nothing but stand by and watch.
“The one and only. You may call me Fami, though, in polite company.”
“What are you doing in a human high school?”
“That, my dear sister, is none of your business.”
“Have you been here long?!”
The girl shrugged.
“So, your name is ‘Yoru,’ now?” Fami asked with a chuckle. “Yoru and Asa? The ‘night’ to her ‘day?’ How…how quaint.”
“…It’s none of your business what I call myself,” Yoru growled.
“Seriously, War,” Fami said as she shook her head. “Where has the tactician portion of your brain gone? You know better than all of us that if you decide to keep your host alive, it is better to let them handle human matters.”
“Asa’s incompetent!”
“She’s more competent than the ‘you’ at present, sister. If so much of you has been eaten already that you can't think rationally, it’s probably an excellent idea for you to go off yourself rather than trying to cling on in your current state. Darkness will banish you back earth-side soon enough.”
Asa felt Yoru’s hands begin to shake.
“I have things to get done before I can do that,” the War Devil declared with exaggerated confidence.
Fami gave a sigh.
“‘Yoru,’ I adore you, but you must think more carefully. I’ve been eavesdropping for a few days. You had a good idea, but this should be a solo mission for Asa. If you want a successful pair bond partner worthy of turning into a weapon, they will have to be utterly devoted to her, and to her alone.”
Fami switched her attention to the human in their midst.
“Pardon me, Asa, while I borrow War for a bit. She needs a vacation of sorts, I think. We’ll touch base with you in a few days, perhaps?”
“Wait, Asa! Don’t trust—"
Like that, the two disappeared into thin air.
“Yoru?”
Asa’s headspace was deafeningly silent now.
What…what just happened?
She looked around to make sure that no one else was in the stairwell.
“Yoru?” Asa whisper-screamed aloud.
Nothing.
Asa was alone once again. A split-second moment of thrill and triumph was replaced by all-encompassing dread. Asa didn’t know the first thing about building a pair bond. She was barely eighteen—such things usually didn’t happen until one was in their mid-twenties. Heck, she could barely talk to hot people, let alone people who smelled of omega pheromones.
Calm down, Asa.
She felt a looming panic attack coming on.
Yoru might not kill you if you try to make a pair bond and figure out you can’t do it. Instead, you can just pretend to make a friend. Yoru would probably be okay with that level of weapon if push comes to shove.
Sweat trickled down her spine. Asa didn’t want to kill an innocent of her own volition. She needed a better reason to do this.
This omega person’s offering paid sex in a high school bathroom. Fifty yen for five minutes, my ass. They’re basically offering themselves up for free. What a wildly irresponsible thing to do. They’re a public health and safety hazard, that’s what they are. It’s illegal, too, what they’re doing. It is 1998. We’re not in the Meiji era anymore. Unregulated prostitution was banned outright in Japan ninety years ago. This person’s nothing but a criminal.
If Asa had to hurt anyone or anything, maybe she could take down a criminal while she was at it. She went to her dress pocket and pulled out her battered leather wallet. Emboldened by her brainstorming and justifications, Asa just needed a game plan now.
I’m gonna have to infiltrate this operation like a customer. That means I’ll need money to talk to this person.
Asa got to the top of the stairs without tripping. Sitting down on the cold tile at the very top of the stairwell, she began to rifle through her wallet.
It contained her identification, her metro card, a photo of her mom, four paper receipts, five crisp ten thousand yen paper bills freshly obtained from the bank, and one ten yen coin. Asa doubted the omega individual in the bathroom would have change for such a large bill.
Asa felt annoying tears prick in her eyes. She needed this money—it was her food, transportation, and new uniform money. All of this had to last her to the end of the month, except now it wouldn’t. If she didn’t do this, Yoru would destroy the rest of Asa’s consciousness. She didn’t want to die.
You need to find a way to get them alone.
Asa did the mental math. If it was fifty yen for five minutes, then that was six hundred yen for an hour. That meant it would be 14,400 yen for a day. With 50,010 yen in her hands, she could buy three days with the omega individual, plus a tip.
That’ll be enough time for their heat to subside, for us to be “friends,” and for me to at least halfway complete the job.
Asa tried to smile to herself.
Perfect.
❦
Asa's entire body was hot and red as a tomato as she stood in a curved line of ten other alphas, all the rest of whom were various male students she didn’t recognize. They curved along the wall of the crusty bathroom, cumulatively careful to ensure the door was completely shut to keep curious faculty from coming inside.
The clients smelled of barely contained rut, but none of them appeared to be acting off of their medications. Male ruts were generally much harder to contain than those like Asa’s own, which meant the suppressants were brutal to a bystander’s nose—a tinny smell that left a metallic taste in one’s mouth. Asa’s ruts were longer, but much milder. She was grateful that she could survive two days at a time on nothing but a cheap over-the-counter generic injector pen version of a rut suppressant medication that had been on the market since 1985. These poor guys had to take the daily scent blocker pill in addition to the more recent weekly rut suppressant injection mediation that was still under patent.
She felt the other clients frequently glance over at her.
What’s she doing here?
Asa wanted to dig a hole into the floor and go die in it. It was hard enough being one of two female alpha students in Fourth East High School. Asa knew her already poor reputation would worsen being here, especially after what just occurred with Yuko and Asa’s public indecency. Rumors would spread, whether she liked it or not.
She kept her eyes trained squarely on the tips of her indoor shoes. The omega was doing their business in the middle stall. Surprisingly silent for allegedly being in their heat.
Her eyes watered from the combination of boys' bathroom stench, tinny-smelling and sexually frustrated alpha boys, and the overwhelming smell of an unmedicated omega person.
Books, especially those with flowery prose, loved to wax poetically about the scents of omega people. Citrusy or floral scents. Comparisons to island sunsets and rich petrichor. Stuff like that. All of it was hogwash meant to appeal to beta readers.
Omega people didn’t smell like perfumes or colognes. The unfettered omega scent was a normal body odor. If it had to be compared to something, Asa would say it was a pleasant nutty scent. It was calming to her and others like her, kind of like how clean newborn babies smell slightly like mild cheese or sweet milk bread to their mothers, she would guess.
Her stomach twisted with nerves.
I want to go back to class, Asa thought wistfully.
Asa was first in line now. The guy in front of her was nearly done. Her clammy hands pulled out the five ten thousand yen bills and the one ten yen coin as the middle stall’s door unlocked. The alpha dude before her slipped out, adjusting himself as he zipped up his fly.
“Next,” the omega person announced. A guy, it seemed.
Asa took a deep breath and scrambled inside, securely locking the stall door behind her. She squeezed her eyes shut before she could see the omega person in front of her.
“Hello! Please take this!” she shouted dumbly as she held the money out in a fan, her thumb pressed against the coin, and bowed. She cringed inside.
Crap, I’m already off to a bad start.
She should’ve been practicing what she wanted to say while she stood still as a scarecrow in line.
“…Mitaka, right? Mitaka Asa?”
The voice was familiar. Husky, but not yet quite dropped all the way.
No.
“What’re ya doing here?” he continued, his words slightly slurred. His scent hit her square in the nostrils. Agonizingly strong and definitely unmedicated. If she was an alpha male, she’d be ready to fuck into the person in front of her too.
No, no, no.
Asa opened her eyes and scanned the scene in front of her once before averting her eyes to the water-stained ceiling tiles. The boy still wore his jacket. His shirt, its front hem wet with saliva, was pulled up just far enough to expose his lower abs. The navy uniform-issued neck guard was loosened. Its absence partially revealed the swollen pink gland on the left side of his neck. Hickeys decorated the skin around it. His uniform pants were bunched up in a corner behind the toilet. His boxers were rolled down and wrapped around his right ankle, exposing him completely from the waist down. Red handprints and crescent fingernail impressions from countless strangers decorated the pale skin on his shamelessly parted thighs.
Of course.
“No, seriously, why are ya here?” he spoke more soberly now, skepticism coloring his tone. He sat up and slouched forward, his elbows resting on his knees. Asa noticed the numerous used condoms present in the open trashcan receptacle.
Of course, the omega person had to be the stupid Chainsaw Man freak from the rooftop.
Asa let her eyes drop to his face, being careful to not let them wander father down. His dark blond hair was even more askew than it was when they first met, sticking up at awkward angles due to sweat and strange hands running through the locks. He looked worse than he did back then too—unkempt, tired, and probably experiencing the worst of his heat right now, judging by his thick scent.
To her utmost horror, Asa felt the most unwelcome emotion drop into her stomach: pity.
I can’t remember his name.
“Did Yoshida put you up to this?” he asked in a slightly hushed voice.
Yoshida? Oh…oh yeah, the tall pretty boy with all the piercings.
“No, he didn’t.”
“Swear it?”
“Swear it,” Asa responded.
She needed to get this over with.
“Look—” Asa began in the most polite voice she could muster. She dropped back into her proper bow, the fanned money still held extended in front of her. “You’re a public health hazard. I’m paying for you to stay home for three days.”
“...Huh?”
“I’m asking you to shut up, take the money, and come with me.”